The FFC Rumour Mill: Atta bid rejected as Man United look at Silva

Jack Stroudley looks through the latest rumours surrounding Fulham over the past week.

Despite injuries and players out at AFCON, things are going extremely well for Fulham at the moment. While it’s been a good few weeks, the need for reinforcements remains. Let’s take a look at all the transfer gossip from the first week of the January window.

Incomings

The biggest news of the week comes from Fabrizio Romano who reported last Saturday that Fulham have had a €20m bid rejected from Udinese for French midfielder Arthur Atta. The Italian side has no interest in selling the 22 year old this window after only signing permanently for them last summer. While I don’t know a lot about Atta, looking at his stats, he’s the type of profile Fulham need in midfield, desperate for more creativity and goals. I’m not sure this will come to anything, but it’s good to see Fulham showing intent in crucial areas with two large bids already rejected this month.

This follows on from last week’s bid for PSV forward Ricardo Pepi, which the Dutch side rejected. While nothing concrete has come since then, various outlets in the Netherlands are suggesting that Fulham are way off valuation. PSV technical director Earnest Stewart told Eindhoven’s Dagblad that Fulham will need a much bigger offer, and Voetbal International have claimed that Fulham will need to pay an “exorbitant fee”. The demand for Pepi won’t go away with Marco Silva keen to get another body in attack and with the 22 year old in good form this season, it will take a much higher bid to make this happen in January.

Elsewhere, the Whites appear to still hold an interest in both Tyrique George and Raheem Sterling from Chelsea, with TeamTalk reporting that we are still keen in signing both from them lot down the road. Sky Sports Germany have backed up the latter of the two claiming that Sterling is leaning more towards a move with Fulham with both ourselves and West Ham interested in the 31 year old.

With the introduction of new manager Liam Rosenior I think it’s worth keeping an eye on both of these. The new boss will want to make his mark and both players will want to get their careers back on track.

Spanish news outlet Estadio Deportivo have reported that Fulham are working on a deal to sign Real Betis midfielder Sergi Altimira with the club already looking at replacements for the 24-year-old. The report goes on to say that Fulham have enquired over the Spaniard who is valued between €20 to €25m.

Finally, Spanish outlet Futbol Fichajes have reported that Fulham and AFC Bournemouth are interested in Deportivo de La Coruna winger Yeremay Hernandez. The 23-year-old has scored seven times this season and is valued at €40m by the Spanish side. While someone of this quality is someone who would improve Fulham, I’m not sure there’s any truth in this. We would surely look to spend €40m on other areas of the pitch before another winger (especially with Wilson’s good form).

Outgoings

The Telegraph have reported that Marco Silva’s name has been discussed internally by Manchester United following the departure of Ruben Amorim. Silva is on a shortlist alongside Andoni Iraola and FC Porto’s Francesco Farioli while The Sun are claiming that Fulham are “bracing” for an approach from Manchester United. This rumour isn’t something that will shock anyone with Silva’s contract expiring in the summer, but I’m not sure it will go anywhere for now. If Silva doesn’t like the current ownership he’s hardly going to enjoy working for INEOS and with United seemingly looking at appoint Ole Gunnar Solskjær on a caretaker role until the end of the season, this is one that may drag on into the summer months.

German reporter Manuel Bonke has suggested that Bayern Munich will look to terminate Jonah Kusi-Asare’s loan this month with the Swedish striker only playing 23 minutes of Premier League football since arriving on deadline day. JKA wanted the Premier League move while Bayern were more reluctant. This has nothing short of a disaster, so I can totally see it happening. Regardless, Fulham need extra bodies in attack.

Finally, Paris FC are taking an interest in French defender Issa Diop according to L’Equipe and have made contact with the 28 year old. I’d like to see Diop stay as he’s always a dependable player to bring off the bench when we need to see games out. However, this is something we could explore in the summer. Diop’s contract runs out in 2027 and you’d imagine he wants to play more football, see out the season and look to cash in during the summer so that we make some of the money back we spent on him.